How do you feel about testing/isolation ending?

[Usernumber5253747293]

If it happens ^

I was speaking to a relative earlier and I was saying how glad I will be when and if all the isolation and testing rules end. It's not that I don't take covid seriously, because we really have. I spent nearly 2 years being so anxious about getting to catching it and being fine!! I know not everyone gets away with it's so mildly but my experience of covid wasn't too bad at all!

Anyway, both dc have sen. Isolation periods have been hard (Dd has had covid twice) m, holding down to test them has been hard, waiting for test results etc. I can't bloody wait to feel like I don't have to anymore. We all had covid in December. The isolation period was hell, far worse than the actual illness. My dc were climbing the walls! Dc had barely any symptoms really and found the isolation hard.

Of course if dc were ill I'd keep them off until better as I would have before covid. I've always kept my kids away from people when germy.

My relative is moaning about all the rules ending and how it will spread it! Which is ironic as they were very poorly last month with covid symptoms and didn't test or isolate but that's another story 😅

I just feel people should use their common sense. If you feel ill, stay home. If you have to go out when ill don't go too close to people, wash your hands and practise good respiratory hygiene!

It's a good thing right? Surely I'm not the only one waiting ever so patiently for any announcement over it 😅

@sunflower1993

Quite frankly: absolutely petrified for the vulnerable people who are still dying every day.

I'm also concerned, as a secondary school teacher they have taken away our right to WFH as of September 2021.

I will be working until 35 weeks pregnant, surrounded by children who may or may not be positive when the NHS guidelines tell me it's dangerous for my pregnancy and that I'm vulnerable

taken away our right to work from home during third trimester

I wish the government would give more information rather than just an announcement that all restrictions are going. How are care homes going to deal with this? At the moment my Mum's care home is in a perpetual lockdown as each time there is a positive staff member, it sets off a 14 day isolation of the home. it has been like this since mid December. What about our hospitals? Are they going to continue testing before admittance?

They need to get rid of those T& T bods as they won't be needed now, don't want any more tax payers money wasted paying them

I’m very pleased. Lots of things are mild to the vast majority of the population but dangerous to a small percentage, measles, flu, pneumonia etc, but we don’t pass laws telling people to stay home. The damage to society due to the self isolation was starting to cause more damage than it prevented. When it’s past that tipping point it’s time to end the restriction.

Glad it’s going

They’ll end up being a two tier system where hospital workers and carers will have to test and stay off work but that’ll increase as it’ll be in community even more so we’ll have no staff and everyone will expect hospitals to get back to normal and shout at us (bit like now but worse).

Delighted!!

Although, gutted I never got to take advantage of 2 weeks/10 days off work on full pay as I got covid over xmas when my office was shut anyway and bar a sore throat and tiredness I felt fine.

We stopped testing last summer, if we were poorly enough to feel rough we stayed home as we have done for decades before.

Any illness has the ability to kill someone, not just covid.

With the exception of Mumsnet, there doesn't seem to be a lot of support for this move. Many scientists, doctors etc are calling for continued testing and surveillance at the very least. Countries that have already removed the legal restrictions have done so with strong public health messaging - it's not a free-for-all. For example, in Denmark there remains recommendations that individuals and businesses should still follow public health guidance to minimise spread of infection. Schools, for example, are recommended to ask symptomatic children for PCR tests and request that they should stay off school with symptoms.

It will be intetesting to see how Boris navigates this tomorrow and how businesses respond.

@CarrieBlue

Really really worried. Not everyone gets a truly mild case, in fact everyone I know who has had it recently has had an unpleasant case, children included.

I feel really upset by the triumphalism about it all too from some people, it’s very brexit-reminiscent and very uncaring about those who are concerned - it’s not pleasant.

Lots of things are unpleasant. Chicken pox can be horrible, as can flu, norovirus etc. No one wants them. But when people have these and are really ill they isolate anyway because they’re in bed.

We can’t expect to go our whole lives without getting sick sometimes.

I’d still like to see testing available to those who want to continue testing for a little longer. I also think people are already not testing. Also there’s going to be a lot of people off work, saying they are ill when there’s no testing available, some will exploit the system. But this, in turn will stop those being off work whilst supposingly waiting for PCR results.

It’s so hard, as for 2 years now we’ve learned to live with isolation, testing, keeping distance from people and generally doing all we can to avoid catching covid, to suddenly lift everything and expect people to go back to pre covid living.

I think lots of companies will continue with bubble working, just to help with too many people being off at the same time. Where my DS works, they are still having a hard time getting staff back in.

*Kids come in full of cold, dodgy stomachs, feeling sick often just before the hols and inevitably you catch it. We had a kid come in on Thursday who really should have been at home in bed. Wonder how many people he passed his cold on to, messing up their holiday plans.

*That has always and will always be the case! Kids catch lots of diseases easily as their immune systems are being built up

Probably best to avoid becoming a teacher if that we're a problem for you.

The cost to society of the isolation rules are now much bigger than the effects of covid!

Also there’s going to be a lot of people off work, saying they are ill when there’s no testing available, some will exploit the system.

But you don't need a 'test' to feel ill from a cold, flu, norovirus, headache etc...?!

@ihearttc

I’ve not been overly worried about Covid the entire time and I honestly thought I’d be relieved by this but I’m a TA and the thought of being in a classroom surrounded by lots of Covid positive kids is actually really scary.

You could be already.... A lot of kids won't have symptoms or routinely test.

It has to end at some point. It's been two years. If not now, when?

@nether temperature is no longer a common symptom of Covid.

@Halloweenrainbow

With the exception of Mumsnet, there doesn't seem to be a lot of support for this move. Many scientists, doctors etc are calling for continued testing and surveillance at the very least. Countries that have already removed the legal restrictions have done so with strong public health messaging - it's not a free-for-all. For example, in Denmark there remains recommendations that individuals and businesses should still follow public health guidance to minimise spread of infection. Schools, for example, are recommended to ask symptomatic children for PCR tests and request that they should stay off school with symptoms.

It will be intetesting to see how Boris navigates this tomorrow and how businesses respond.

I’m not sure your first sentence is true. I agree with your point about doctors & scientists, but with the general public I think it’s pretty mixed. I certainly don’t think it’s just a MN thing.

We can’t keep it in place forever. At some point our approach is going to have to be brought in line with most other infectious diseases. We manage with guidance rather than threats of court and police action for other things.

I would like to see sick pay improved, though (both the SSP rate itself and the eligibility for getting it). That would do more to fix people coming in to work ill overall. And I’d hope LFTs still remain available for settings where they’re particularly useful.

Some people now seem to be dividing the world of diseases up into “covid, which is bad, vs everything else, which is fine” which isn’t great either. I have absolutely seen people with symptoms of some respiratory disease talk about how they weren’t going to visit vulnerable Granny until they had a negative covid test - as if other things couldn’t make Granny pretty ill too. Or people thinking covid is the only nasty disease you can transmit without having nasty symptoms yourself, so if you’re not actively really ill then nobody’s at risk from your mild tummy bug/bit of a temperature/etc.

Tbh I don't think I could cope with it going on any longer. And I say that as someone who has close family who are ecv and they feel exactly the same.

Dm died in September after spending the last 18 months of her life not hugging her family and mostly staring at the world out of her window (came outside if the weather was good)

We are now in a similar position with DF. We have all decided to carry on life as normal, taking him out, enjoying whatever time we have left with him whatever happens. He's actually had covid, caught it during his last spell in hospital!

I feel for vulnerable people as many of the ones I know are worried.

I’ll keep testing if I can get tests and I’ll isolate if I get symptoms/test positive.

Very happy. Completely over the whole thing.

@Shadeelane

Yeah can't wait to be surrounded by covid positive kids in a tiny classroom. Plenty of young, fit and healthy staff at my school have been ill/left with lasting symptoms so no, not massively looking forward to it. I get that we can't do this forever and I don't know what the answer is other than hang fire til April maybe.

It's alright saying stay home if you're ill but as anyone who works in a school will tell you, this just doesn't happen. Kids come in full of cold, dodgy stomachs, feeling sick often just before the hols and inevitably you catch it. We had a kid come in on Thursday who really should have been at home in bed. Wonder how many people he passed his cold on to, messing up their holiday plans.

Just before Christmas a kid came in, knowingly covid positive and took out 3 members of staff meaning their Christmas plans were ruined.

It's bollocks. People do not stay at home when they're ill when they're legally required to so why would they if it's not required.

On the other hand it will be nice not to have to worry about plans being ruined because of a positive lateral flow.

I want us to get to this stage, I really do but it just feels a little early.

You are already surrounded by Covid positive kids I can assure you.

Concerned.

Teachers not allowed to be normal human beings then, @Blubells ?

@Blubells

*Kids come in full of cold, dodgy stomachs, feeling sick often just before the hols and inevitably you catch it. We had a kid come in on Thursday who really should have been at home in bed. Wonder how many people he passed his cold on to, messing up their holiday plans. *That has always and will always be the case! Kids catch lots of diseases easily as their immune systems are being built up

Probably best to avoid becoming a teacher if that we're a problem for you.

I'm a TA actually and it's not a problem for me personally. It's a problem for schools though, and kids and parents when there's not enough staff to teach and whole classes have to be sent home(yes this has happened in our school).

Thing is chicken pox, meningitis, flu etc aren't rife in the community. Covid is and it's making plenty of people in schools sick. I know people on Mumsnet insist it's just a cold but that hasn't been my experience with my colleagues. I'm lucky, I seem to be immune but if asymptomatic kids can come in and spread it around unchecked I can't see it ending well. And yes obviously it is already happening to some degree but how much impact will it have if everyone who tests positive but is asymptomatic takes no measures to prevent spread.

Maybe it will be fine, who knows but until the science and experts who actually know what they're talking about say it's fine I'll not be convinced it is.

People saying they want “the scientists” to advise on whether this is a good idea or not - what sort of statement is it you’re looking for scientists to make?

Scientists are experts on their own part of their own field. So the right scientists could say, “we think this will/will not massively increase community transmission.” But they can’t say “taking into account every single factor of everything going on here - the transmission, the impact on behaviour, the impact on society and business and public services, the best use of this money which could be used elsewhere in the health service - this is A Good Thing or A Bad Thing.” They’re specialists, not demigod gurus who can advise on every human interaction and social structure.